Guitarist / Educator / Composer

Happy New Year! I don’t know about you, but 2014 was a DOOZY for me. I couldn’t wait for it to end; in fact, after I finished doing grades for the fall semester at Berklee College of Music I spent a lot of time sleeping. Who could blame me? I had a crazy semester and a crazy year. I also have two really adorable cats (Euclid and Spackle) that love naps and are almost like dogs in that they love to cuddle.

Well, 2015 is here and I am loving it. So far I have all of this renewed energy, and I’m playing lots of music and getting things done. I’m even back to my teenage hobby of counted cross stitch, though now, instead of making needlepoint pictures of flowers, I stitch things like replicas of 1980s Van Halen.

Every year I choose three words that I would like to guide the year. This way, I can’t really break my resolutions; there aren’t any to break. After thinking about it a long time, I chose these:

Community
– Spending more time with friends and family.
– Sharing my music with the community at large.
– Creating programming that makes a positive difference for others.
Completion
– Working on one thing at a time
– Finish all of those projects I start instead of doing them halfway
– Not being afraid to work on that one thing for a very long time if that’s what it takes
– Not being afraid to go back to a project and finish what I started (which may have been AGES ago).
Commitment
– To myself
– To others, including YOU!
– To Community and Completion

Maybe I made New Year’s Day mean more than I ought to, but whatever I did, so far it’s working (and we’re 23 days in). I also convinced myself that even if it’s a bad day, tomorrow is a new day and I can start all over. It feels great!

What does that mean for you? Do you have three words that you would like 2015 to be about? It’s a fun little exercise and a lot less daunting than the usual, “I will do this and this and this and this…” that so many of us do every year. For me anyway, that’s such a setup for disappointment.

There will be more music this year to be sure. I have a CD I’m shopping for a label (yes it sounds very 20th century but I’m doing it anyway), I’m writing more music to Pirkei Avot verses, and I’m going into the studio to record my original compositions inspired by my love of Formula One racing. There’s also a project I’m doing with Joe Fiedler on trombone that performs the music of Attila Zoller and Albert Mangelsdorff as well as some original music, and we’re having a great time with that.

As the great Billy Strayhorn would say, “Onwards and Upwards!”

And as Rabbi Rami Shapiro writes in his modern interpretation of the Pirkei Avot, Chapter 1 Verse 3:

Live Without Hesitation.
Dwell not on outcome or reward.
Act with full attention.

The words “I’m bored” haven’t crossed my lips since that time I was 16 years old, went to a party in the woods where everyone was doing nothing but drinking beer, and left after about three minutes to go home and practice. (Yes, it was a weekend. But time without a guitar in my hands is time wasted.)

Heaven forbid I sit still for one second. But that’s o.k., because it means that I have fun adventures. It also means fun adventures to share with you, my dear reader.

Here’s how it happened: there’s this great space in Queens called Single Cut Beersmiths. They’re the first micro-brewery to open in Astoria (Queens) since Prohibition, and they love guitar. (For those of you who aren’t big guitar fanatics, a Single Cut guitar has a body that has been “cut away” to make access to the higher frets of the guitar easier to reach.) Since I love guitar, and I love beer (even though yes, I did leave a party where there was beer drinking – it wasn’t good beer, and we were sitting on rocks in the woods) I thought, “the perfect combination!”

Sure enough, Single Cut has a stage in their tap room, complete with guitar amps, bass amps, and a big drum set. Members of the Queens Jazz OverGround met with the managers/owners of Single Cut, and a two-day jazz festival took place in October 2013. We had seven Queens-based jazz bands, including Mostly Other People Do The Killing and Safety Buffalo.

Now it’s time for a guitar festival! I’ve teamed up with my buddy and fellow Six-Stringer Mike Baggetta for a monthly concert series featuring some of the best (and our favorite) guitar players out there. We’ll be at Single Cut featuring three different FABULOUS guitar groups the third Friday in April, May, and June.

It’s a new thing for me to be curator of a concert series. I’ve had a little bit of experience with it through the Queens Jazz OverGround and our partnership with Flushing Town Hall, but this is all guitar. And you know me – I LOVE guitar. And Mike and I were able to get some of the best for this series: David Torn (April 18), David Tronzo (May 16), Nels Cline and Julian Lage (June 20).

Sometimes I think I’m crazy for doing something like organizing a concert series and all that goes with it: getting sponsors, getting the word out, etc. But then I think, “Wow, so much great guitar for three concerts over the course of three months” AND I get to be the opening band for DAVID TRONZO’s trio and I think: “Oh Yeah!”

About a month ago, my grandfather’s brother Walter E. Monaco passed away at the age of 91. I hadn’t seen him in years; he had been living in San Antonio, TX since 2009 and before that had spent almost his entire adult life in Europe. The longest period of time I spent with him was in the summer of 1988 when he stayed at my house for six weeks and I was a sullen teenager interested in nothing but locking myself in my room and practicing. (Come to think of it, I still just want to lock myself in my room and practice; guess some things never change.)

What I remember about Uncle Walt was his big smile, his incredible stories and his love of life. He talked about being on the bobsled team for the United States in the 1950s; he told me that saxophonist Stan Getz used to shoot heroin in his bathroom every time he was in Germany. After Uncle Walt left our house that summer, my mother found a half-empty bottle of vodka stashed away in the guest room. I remember smiling then, because my mother was horrified, and I – being a sullen teenager – thought it was hysterical and matched Uncle Walt’s mischievous personality perfectly.

Sadly I was unable to attend his funeral, but my sister did, and she marveled at the stories told about his life, and the family that found him the retirement community in San Antonio and were taking care of him until the end. She also showed me an email from Sir Stirling Moss, a famous Formula One racecar driver in the 1950s. Sir Moss was a friend of Uncle Walt’s, and had written to the family to express his condolences.

The news that my Uncle Walt was friends with someone involved in Formula One Racing was something I hadn’t heard of before. Being that Formula One is the name of my band, I went online and did a little research on my Uncle Walt. What I found was astonishing: not only did he spend time with Formula One racecar drivers, but he also tried the sport himself. I found out this information from a lovely tribute that the fascinating pilot and racecar enthusiast Carlos Ghys posted of Uncle Walt: http://www.carlosghys.be/html/biography_walt.html

(Carlos also wrote on his biography page that Uncle Walt was a cousin of Frank Sinatra’s. This is news to me, but now I’m a bit curious so I’ll do some research.)

Anyway, this was all very exciting stuff – seeing the photos, reading about the people he knew in the racing world, and also in show business (Errol Flynn was a buddy of his). I regret not having kept in touch; I think he would have been delighted to hear that I had an interest in Formula One racing and that I had named my band after it…

About a year ago, I began working with Marty Khan, a super cool and super wise man with 30-plus years’ experience in the jazz business as well as the author of the best jazz business book ever written, Straight Ahead. Marty’s ideas are simple yet powerful; they are so simple, in fact, that many don’t get what he’s trying to do, which is to create sustainability in the life of a jazz artist through logical steps, one of which is the concept of Collective Action.

For me, Collective Action comes in the form of the Queens Jazz OverGround. Together with trumpeter Josh Deutsch, bassist Mark Wade, and drummer Brian Woodruff, the four of us meet regularly to pursue our mission of bringing more jazz to the borough of Queens – or, as I like to say, bringing jazz home to Queens. For Queens used to be – and continues to be – home to more jazz musicians than you would think. From Ella Fitzgerald and Louis Armstrong to Jimmy Heath and James Spaulding (the latter two still residents of the borough), Queens is a jazz home.

There’s this long hallway that connects the AirTrain to JFK to the Long Island Railroad and ends at the Sutphin Blvd Subway Station. In this hallway, you will see numerous banners listing all of the jazz legends who lived in Queens at one time or another (or still do). There’s also a sign that says “Queens: Home to Jazz Legends” and also lists their names on the wall. (You can see a photo HERE.)

It is because of this Collective Action that we have some exciting news: less than one year into the start of the Queens Jazz OverGround, we are thrilled to be presenting an all-day jazz festival at Flushing Town Hall. There will be collage workshops for the kids; middle and high school jazz bands performing all day; improvisation workshops and rhythm section workshops; and concerts starting at 5 p.m. with the York College Jazz Orchestra and continuing with bandleaders from Queens.

The highlight of the evening will be the performance of Queens resident and Jazz Legend James Spaulding, a saxophonist and flutist who you’ve heard on recordings by Wayne Shorter and Herbie Hancock, among others. We are beyond excited that he will be playing at our first ever jazz festival.

I never could have done this by myself. Many thanks to Josh, Mark, and Brian, as well as to J.Walter Hawkes (our IT guy/resident trombonist) and Teri Wade (our fearless logistics leader). This is Collective Action at its finest. And we are having a blast; and are able to share this music that we love with you.

I do hope we see you there on April 27.

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Every January I tell myself, “this will be the year of blogging!” and every January SOMETHING comes up. Or I get overwhelmed.

This year’s excuse? My new web site.

I know, I know…a new web site? That’s good news, right? And YES, it IS good news. And Mary K Elkins did a FANTASTIC job on it, methinks. And now that the Mayan Apocalypse is behind us (though I hear there is an Inca Apocalypse on its way…) I am committed to getting. this. technology. thing. together.

It’s amazing what an age difference of a few years can make. My 31-year-old guitar student (ok, so he does work in computers) can build web sites with his eyes closed and one hand tied behind his back, while I sit here thinking, “if I type the wrong letter will the computer explode?!” and I walk away. It’s kind of like when I was a kid in Phys. Ed. and someone would throw the ball to me; instead of catching it, I would block its path by crossing both of my arms in front of my face and shrieking. As I enter my 40th year (the big birthday is October 27!) I realize that while it’s not that far away from 31, from a technology standpoint, it’s light years behind. But my student has graciously offered to help me. He is a very patient man.

Besides, it all boils down to this: “I can’t. I have to practice.” My mantra. Forever. Every once in a while I will see this sign posted randomly in some classroom or office when I am in Boston for my weekly teaching gig at Berklee College of Music, and it makes me feel like I’m home. So I’ll always gravitate to the guitar before anything else; I’ve been that way since 1985, why stop now?

But I’ll make more time for technology this year. That’s a promise; or a threat, depending on how you see it. Until next time,

Big Hugs,
Amanda

p.s. As I tried to update my news page with this new post, I almost wrecked the entire programming of the page! Fortunately it didn’t allow me to. I need to be more careful…

Ah, December. It’s hard to believe that as I type this, we’re thick in the middle of the holiday season. Where did the time go? I think the older I get, the faster the time goes…

It was an amazing year. Teaching at Berklee has been super and I’m looking forward to the Spring semester, when I teach my first class, a Jazz Styles Lab. (This semester I had private students only. They were fantastic!)

This year also saw the release of “The Pirkei Avot Project, Vol. 1″, my CD of music composed to excerpts from an ancient collection of rabbinical wisdom. Thanks to the generosity of many, the project was partially fueled through RocketHub, a crowdfunding site that brings people together to support projects they believe in.

And with a new CD put out on one’s own label comes…boxes. Boxes of CDs. HUNDREDS of them.

At last count, I have released five CDs as a leader or a co-leader. Four of these five CDs are sitting in my closet, begging to be played on someone’s stereo. These CDs are:

And since ’tis the season for giving gifts, I’ve decided that I will sell these CDs at very special prices, autograph them, wrap them in festive paper, and mail them to you. Buy one CD for $8, two for $14, three for $18, four for $20. I accept PayPal at amanda@amandamonaco.com and also checks mailed to:

PO Box 1695
Long Island City NY 11101

Thank you for continuing to give me the opportunity to share my music with you. May your holiday season be joyous, filled with laughter, love, and peace.

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